It's Over Isn't It?
by Interspark
Summary: With the Time War just ended, both the Doctor and the TARDIS need time to deal with their injuries. The damaged and agonised time machine lands on a bright, sunny beach, and the dying Time Lord finds, to his great surprise, that there are still Gems on earth, thousands of years after the end of the Gem War. (Credit for thumbnail to lizzyfrommars on Tumblr)
1. Chapter 1

It's Over Isn't It?

 **So this is the first crossover fic I've ever published. I hope you like it! It's about the Ninth Doctor, as he deals with the stress and guilt following the Time War, and coped with his regeneration trauma. It's not treating the 50th anniversary special as canon, since I haven't really enjoyed the show since season 5, so there are a few contradictions.**

The TARDIS lurched back and forth frantically, the machinery screeching and smoke and flames erupting from the console. The Cloister Bell had been chiming ominously since the Doctor had ended the Time War. For just the past ten minutes, he had been the last existing Time Lord, and she was the last TARDIS. It was no wonder she was upset...

In the Doctor's tired and wounded state, he had given up on trying to calm her down and control her. He staggered wearily as he backed away from the console, turning around to protect his face from the fresh burst of flames. He tripped gracelessly forwards on the stairs leading towards the doors and they opened of their own accord, leaving him to collapse, face first out of the TARDIS and on to a bright, sandy beach.

Still feeling his injuries, the Doctor lay almost motionless on the sand, and heard the creaky TARDIS doors close behind him. They both needed time to repair and rebuild after what they'd been through...

The Doctor could feel himself burning up inside and his hearts beating faster. He knew this body was done for. In truth, he probably could have recovered from his injuries without regenerating if he tried, but he couldn't bear to see his current face in the mirror anymore. This was one life he was glad to see end.

With the moments he had left, the Doctor tried to get his bearings. He could hear and smell the sea behind him, the Atlantic, he suspected, but in his disorientated state, he could have been wrong. He turned his head to the right. The bright sunlight hurt his eyes, but he could just about make out an enormous statue built into the cliff, overlooking the sea. It was of a giant woman, not a human, but one with two faces and six arms, although three had succumb to age and crumbled at the wrists. Two of the hands were cradling a small house. The house seemed to be of human design and construction, but the statue clearly wasn't, but the Doctor was in no condition to identify it's origin.

As he felt regeneration energy coursing through him, and saw golden light shining from his hands, the last thing the Doctor heard was the hurried footsteps and breath of someone frantically running towards him, before he shot to his feet and erupted in a violent, golden glow. The feeling was indescribable as the Doctor's skin, blood, bones and flesh all realigned, tearing themselves apart and reassembling in his new form. As it began to fade, the beach swam back into view. The Doctor took in his surroundings again, it was always strange experiencing a place with new eyes and skin, but he could tell that little had changed in the few seconds he had spent regenerating, save for the small boy who had ran over.

The boy seemed around twelve years old. He was a little overweight, with curly black hair and wore a red shirt with a star on it. He stared at the Doctor, open mouthed, with appropriate awe for what he had just witnessed. For some reason, he was holding up his right palm, which looked slightly damp.

"Morning..." The Doctor greeted the child, before, once again, falling face first on the sand.

-x-x-x-

The Crystal Gems had been dealing with disasters of their own. The day had started like any other. Garnet had reported the location of a corrupted gem, and the team had dispatched to contain it without incident. Then, they returned to the temple, where Steven had persuaded everyone to watch an episode of Crying Breakfast Friends with him.

Half way through the episode, Garnet had begun to grow restless. Subtly at first, looking around, with a nervous cringe beneath her visor, before she startled everyone by shooting to her feet.

"Garnet, is everything alright?" Pearl asked, cordially.

"It... I..." Garnet mumbled.

She took a step away from the others, holding her forehead with one hand, resulting in her falling from Steven's raised bedroom, and crashing onto the living room table. As she did, she glowed a bright white, and Ruby and Sapphire emerged, rolling into the centre of the house.

"Whaaa..." Amethyst was quietly perplexed.

"Are you guys okay!?" Steven cried, running down the steps towards them.

Ruby quickly got her bearings and ran towards her partner. "Sapphire!" She desperately cried. "What's wrong!?"

Sapphire stood in place, holding her head and gently writhing in distress. "It's... all... changing!"

Before anyone could ask her to elaborate, a shroud of ice quickly rose from the floor and encompassed the small gem from head to toe.

"Sapphire!" The occupants of the house cried in unison, as they gathered around.

"What's wrong with her!?" Steven desperately asked, looking towards Ruby.

"I... I don't know!" Ruby sobbed, tears welling in her eyes. "One minute we were watching that dumb show, then... then..."

"What!?" Amethyst shouted, anxiously.

"Her future vision just... exploded! Like a million things were about to happen!"

"What does that mean?" Pearl asked, worried and confused in equal parts.

"I don't know!" Ruby angrily replied. "I can't see anymore!"

With Ruby's help, the gems tried melting the ice, which only resulted in it reforming stronger. Sapphire gave no response to any of their pleas. Once they exhausted their immediate options of helping her, they had pushed the frozen gem in front of the house's wood stove in the hopes of thawing her gradually. While they waited, Ruby knelt by Sapphire, looking at her pleadingly through her icy cocoon. Steven and Amethyst sat on the couch, sharing remorseful looks with Sapphire and each other. Pearl had elected to pace back and forth in the kitchen.

Sapphire had been frozen for almost half an hour, when Steven looked towards the door. Along with the sound of the sea, he thought he could hear something else. It was similar to the crashing waves, but different, more coarse and metallic, like a grinding, wheezing sound. It lasted for several seconds, before giving way to the usual sounds of the sea.

"Did... you guys hear that?" Steven looked around, getting shrugs head shakes in response. "I'm... gonna go take a look."

Although curious, Steven main interest was in leaving the house for a moment, to briefly escape his feeling of helplessness. Fortunately, he was greeted by the distracting sight of a strange, blue box on the beach, and just caught a glimpse of its occupant, before he left the box and fell face first onto the sand.

-x-x-x-

"I'm telling you guys! He's some kind of weird gem!"

"Steven, he's clearly a human, just look at him!" Pearl reasoned.

After Steven had witnessed the new arrival's transformation, he had called to Pearl, and she had helped him carry the man indoors, where they had laid him down on the sofa.

"But I saw him change his body! He was really hurt, so he burst into light and changed, just like you guys do! Well... kinda..."

Steven had only seen the man briefly before he changed, but he could tell that he looked very different. His hair was much shorter, for one thing, barely concealing the shape of his head, he had bony cheeks and a larger than average nose and ears.

"But gems don't change instantly! They..."

"UGH! WHO CARES!?" Ruby roared over the two of them. "He has nothing to do with Sapphire!"

"Well... he might be!" Steven said. "I mean, he couldn't have carried that box here like he is now. It must be some kind of spaceship, like the Roaming Eye!"

"Steven, that's not a spaceship, it's a police box from earth." Pearl said, knowingly. "It was a means of contacting law enforcement in the British Isles, during the 19th and 20th century." She frowned and rubbed her chin, thoughtfully. "Although I can't imagine what it's doing here..."

Steven produced his phone. "Well I'm gonna send a picture of him to Peridot. She was on Homeworld the last, so she'll know if he's some kind of fancy modern gem, designed to blend in or something."

As Steven approached, the man groaned and rolled slightly in his direction.

"It's all... changing..." He mumbled, with a worried look on his face.

Steven recoiled, and the occupants of the house shared a started look.

"That's what Sapphire said!" Ruby loudly reminded everyone.

"So this guy does have something to do with what's happening?" Amethyst theorised.

"Well... it's only three words, it could be a coincidence." Pearl said, although she was clearly doubtful.

Ruby pushed past Amethyst on her way to the couch. She lifted the man's long, black coat and started to rummage through his pockets.

"Ruby!" Steven criticised. "People don't like it when you do that!"

The angry red gem ignored him and began to empty the man's pockets onto the floor behind her, looking for some form of identification. The contents of the man's pockets seemed almost disproportionate to their size. The majority of what Ruby found were crumpled up balls of paper, with strange, circular symbols drawn on them. She also found a leather wallet with a blank sheet of paper in it, and a silver tube with a blue bulb at one end.

"I've never seen symbols like these before..." Pearl murmured, as she straightened out one of the balls of paper.

"What do you think that thing's for?" Steven asked, as Amethyst picked up the silver tube.

With little forethought or consideration, Amethyst inserted the tube into her left nostril. "Well I don't think it's meant for nose picking..." She laughed gently. "It's lousy at it."

Ruby's frustrated groaning interrupted the group's investigation as it slowly grew in volume. "SAPPHIRE!" She screamed at them, as her anger overcame her.

Pearl frowned irritably. "Ruby, we are all worried about Sapphire, but right now, this man is the best clue we have as to..."

Pearl was interrupted by an ear-splitting boom, followed shortly after by an equally loud, although significantly different crash. It was a combination of sounds they had all heard before. Something large had just broken earth's atmosphere and landed nearby.

"Wh... what was that?" Steven asked, rhetorically.

"We'll go check it out." Pearl said, authoritatively. "Ruby, you stay here with Sapphire and this person."

Before Ruby could protest, the remaining Crystal Gems ran for the door and across the beach in the direction of the sound. After their footsteps faded, Ruby clutched her head and began pacing in a circle, growling quietly. Eventually, she realised that she was leaving scorch marks in the wooden floor, which only seemed to irritate her further.

She leapt onto the man's torso and grabbed him by the collar.

"This is all your fault!" She shouted at his unconscious form. "Everything was all fine until you showed up and did whatever you did to Sapphire!" She paused, as if to wait for a reaction. When none came, she cried out in anger. "Well let's see you hurt Sapphire when you're even MORE unconscious!"

Ruby lifted her elbow and a small, cylindrical gauntlet appeared on her hand. With a thrust, she sent it hurtling at the man's face. When the gauntlet was inches away, though, the man's eyes shot open. His knee flew upwards like a blur, sending Ruby flying into the wall, by the door and tumbling down the small staircase.

The man rolled off the couch and dropped into an action stance, with one knee on the ground and bracing himself with his fingers. He thrust his hand into his coat pocket and his eyes widened in alarm, before he noticed his silver tube device on the floor at his feet.

Before he could pick it up, Ruby, who had regained her composure at the same time as the stranger, flew at him like a bullet, screaming as she did. The two of them rolled across the floor, towards the warp pad, in a frantic skirmish, with their fists flailing carelessly.

"Stop... hurting... Sapphire!" Ruby cried.

"You what!?" Came the man's confused reply.

The man scurried on his back to the warp pad, practically holding Ruby above him as she continued to flail her fists and feet at his face. He slapped his one, free hand onto the pad and, to Ruby's great surprise, it burst into life, sending a beam of white light, skywards.

Ruby's shock calmed her down immediately. "Whaa? How did..."

Taking advantage of the distraction, the man seized Ruby's shoulders and, twisting his torso, hurled her into the light, which disappeared, along with the furious gem, a second later. The man quickly climbed to his feet, nursing his bruises, walked back to his device, and picked it up off the floor. He twisted the top section carefully, cringing slightly at the bodily fluids coating the bulb.

Behind the stranger, the warp pad burst into life once more, and Ruby reappeared.

"Alright wise guy, I don't know how you did that, but you're not..."

Ruby's voice increased in volume and threat as she stomped across the house towards the man. Just before she came into punching distance, though, the man pointed his device upwards, the blue bulb illuminated, and a quiet buzzing sound could be heard.

Ruby immediately stopped and her eyes widened, as though she had suddenly remembered she'd left the bath running. Her physical form twitched slightly, and then, like the picture on a TV that had been unplugged, blinked away entirely, leaving her gem to fall to the floor.

The man picked up Ruby's gem, looked at it quizzically, and pocketed it. Then he looked around the house, he was definitely on earth, in the early twenty-first century, that was obvious, based on the appliances, so why were there Gems there? The Gem War ended millennia ago.

As he looked around, he noticed Sapphire for the first time. She was frozen in ice, which was understandable. With the Time Lords and the Daleks all dead, the future of the entire universe had just changed dramatically and become a great deal less predictable. Every clairvoyant in the universe would be in considerable distress until they adjusted.

The man cringed and nursed his head as he looked around, for more clues as to why there were Gems on earth still. He shuddered slightly and another wave of golden light rippled over him. Moments later, there was another mighty crash from outside, which quickly got his attention.

"No rest for the wicked, eh?" He muttered to himself, before picking up the leather wallet, and heading towards the house's door.


	2. Chapter 2

The Doctor left the house, and turned to face the source of the crash he had heard. On the beach, two more gems and the boy he had briefly met, were engaging an enormous creature. The monster was translucent, like a jellyfish, and glowed faintly in all the colours of the rainbow. It lashed at its assailants with its many long, featureless appendages. At the top of the monster, was a perfectly spherical orb, the size of a boulder, and pitch black. From the orb, it periodically unleashed white beams of energy, which tore through the sand.

The monster was a refugee from the Time War. The Doctor had arrived on this beach by coincidence, but the monster had been drawn here, because it was from the Gem Homeworld too. It had severed its ties with the Diamonds tens of thousands of years ago though.

The Doctor had planned to dispatch any other Gems he found, just as he had Ruby, but the scene before him complicated things slightly. Not just the monster, but also the individuals attacking it. The Ruby and Sapphire he had seen would have been typical of a Gem invasion force, but the gems on the beach were as atypical as they came.

First, there was the Pearl. She was clearly of an extravagant design, based on her silky clothing and perfect posture, the kind of Peal who could even belong to a Diamond, but more likely the Sapphire in the house, except she was wielding a spear and fighting the monster with it in a way which would put the finest Jasper to shame.

Then there was the Amethyst. She had clearly spent far too long in the ground, and as a result, was barely half the size an Amethyst was supposed to be. If such an Amethyst was lucky enough to not be immediately shattered by her disappointed creator, she would inevitably wind up on security duty in some distant, irrelevant space station. There was no possible scenario the Doctor could imagine, that could cause such an Amethyst to even be on the same planet as such an important-looking Sapphire. Despite all of that, the Doctor couldn't help but notice the skill and confidence with which she slashed at the monster with her surprisingly detailed whips.

Most strange of all, though, was the boy who had been there when the Doctor regenerated. He was clearly a human, and not remotely comparable to any Gem the Doctor knew of. Despite this, the boy leapt around and over the monster with little to no regard for gravity, and attacked it by materialising the pink shield of a Rose Quartz on his arm and throwing it like a frisbee. He would also periodically seal himself in a pink bubble for defense, as the monster's lashing limbs swung in his direction.

Saving his questions for later, the Doctor focused on his priority and ran towards the creature. As he did, the boy and the gems fell back, regrouping between him and the monster.

"Is this thing a corrupted gem?" Steven asked, breathlessly. The orb in its head had fallen to the beach on its own, and its body had formed moments later, shortly after the Crystal Gems arrived. "I didn't know they could get this big!"

"There are stories... legends even, of an ancient superweapon, long before the Cluster, which defied the Diamonds..." Pearl said, without taking her eyes off the creature. "But even if it does exist, why would it be here now!?" She asked. Despite asking rhetorically, Pearl immediately got her answer.

"It's hiding."

The Gems jumped in alarm, to see the Doctor, immediately behind them.

"You're okay!" Steven happily remarked.

"Yo, where's Ruby...?" Amethyst asked him, suspiciously.

"Questions later." The Doctor sternly ordered. "You three keep it busy for a bit longer. I've got an idea."

Without waiting for a reaction, the Doctor raced towards the nearby Beach City. While the Gems were still stunned by the stranger's sudden awakening and reappearance, Steven only just noticed the monster in time to summon his shield, to protect them from another blast of white energy.

"Who is this guy!?" Amethyst shouted over the sound.

"I don't know, but if he's got a plan, then we may as well give him a chance!" Pearl shouted back, resignedly. "Without Garnet, we're out of our depth!"

Once the beam faded, the Gems resumed their attack. Although their weapons sliced through the monster's body like butter, its severed limbs reattached as quickly as they were cut, and any attack aimed at the enormous, black Gem, resulted in a shockwave of energy which sent the Gems and their weapons flying.

Meanwhile, in town, the Doctor raced through the streets, looking left and right. He knew roughly what he was looking for, but couldn't have imagined how fortunate he'd be. Driving slowly down the road towards him, was a campaign van. It featured a large, sculpted head of its driver, a sunburnt man with a receding hairline, and a pair of loudspeakers which repeatedly chanted the words, "Mayor Dewey" in a monotone drawl.

The Doctor sprinted over to the van and yanked open the driver's door.

"Why... hello citizen..." A surprised Dewey greeted the Doctor. "How can..."

"Out." The Doctor ordered. "I need your van."

"Wh... what? This is my campaign vehicle!" The mayor defensively stated.

With a whir of the sonic screwdriver, the mayor's seatbelt snapped away from him, and the Doctor unapologetically dragged him from his seat and onto the pavement, and took his place.

"Nope, it's my sonic resonance amplifier." He said, flashing the deflated Dewey a cheery smile. "See ya!"

The Doctor immediately slammed his foot on the pedal, sending the van screeching down the street with a cloud of exhaust fumes, leaving the defeated politician to stare helplessly as his van rounded a corner.

Back on the beach, the Crystal Gems were standing around the monster, rapidly running out of steam. They clutched their weapons defensively, but every blast of energy from its gem came closer and closer to making contact and blowing its attackers off the face of the beach.

Before they had to resume their attack. The monster's head lurched around towards the town. The Gems shared its interest, as they heard the screeching sound of a vehicle being driven without regard for speed limits or the driver's safety. The mayor's van shot over the boardwalk, smashing through its hand rail and onto the beach, swerving to face the monster as its tires sank into the sand.

In the driver's seat, the Doctor aimed his sonic screwdriver at the van's speaker controls. The repetitive chant of "Mayor Dewey" grew gradually louder and more rapid until it became a singular, ear-splitting whine.

Steven winced and covered his ears. Pearl and Amethyst held their heads and their physical forms began to flicker. The monster swung its head into the air and roared in distress, but after a few moments, its head swung downwards, with its gem pointed squarely at the van.

Without missing a beat, the Doctor kicked the van's door open and swung acrobatically onto the roof, standing between the two speakers. Looking to the small boy, he saw that, mercifully, he was looking back at him. The Doctor shouted the word "SHIELD!" While pointing at his left forearm, holding it in a defensive stance, then held his hands out expectantly. As the monster's gem glowed in preparation for another attack, Steven summoned his shield and hurled it at the Doctor. Not a second too soon, the Time Lord caught the shield and held it up, before another energy blast could destroy the van, and him with it. The Doctor braced himself, wincing as the beam forced him backwards along the van and burnt his fingers.

As soon as the beam faded, the shield vanished, revealing the monster, just in time for the Doctor to see the Amethyst leap up behind it and lash her whips around its head like the reins of a horse. She landed her feet on the back of its neck and pulled its head back, keeping it from attacking the van again.

The Doctor was impressed, he had never seen such a creative Amethyst, but that didn't keep him from doing what he was about to do. With one last command from the sonic screwdriver, the screeching sound from the van's speakers intensified for just a second, sending shockwaves in all directions. Every window in Beach City shattered instantly. The monster writhed and rippled like a plate of jelly, before its body vanished. The enormous gem fell to the beach where it exploded off the sand, launching itself into the sky and out of sight. Pearl and Amethyst's bodies immediately shared the monster's fate, with the exception of their gems remaining helplessly on the sand.

Steven tottered back and forth, his head spinning and the ringing in his ears barely tolerable. The Doctor, seemingly unfazed, jumped down from the van and walked towards him. As he did, he examined the backs of his hands. Where his fingers had been burnt, moments ago, there was more of the glittering, golden light. He blew on them gently, sending the light rippling away, leaving his fingers good as new. He knelt down in the sand, picking up Amethyst and Pearl's gems, just as Steven got his bearings.

"What the... where... is... is it over?" He asked.

"All done, job's a good 'un." The Doctor confidently said, with a smile. "Gem crisis contained."

Steven noticed for the first time, the two gems in the Doctor's hands.

"Amethyst! Pearl!" He cried in alarm.

Before Steven could reach for the two gems, the Doctor immediately dropped down to his eye level and held them up, pointedly.

"Now how about you tell me just who you might be, and what these Gems have told you?"


	3. Chapter 3

The Doctor burst back into the beach house, with an agitated Steven in tow. Sapphire remained frozen, by the stove, which hadn't seemed to have had any effect on the ice encasing her, whatsoever.

"Look, I get that you know what Gems are." Steven began, in a reassuring voice. "But you don't know _those_ Gems! They're not like Homeworld Gems, they're my family!"

The Doctor rummaged through the house's kitchen cupboards, and turned around with three clear plastic bowls. He placed Pearl and Amethyst's gems on the breakfast counter, followed by Ruby's, after retrieving it from his pocket, and placed a bowl over each of them.

"Ruby!" Steven gasped in alarm.

"Gems don't have families." The Doctor sternly told the boy. "They're a mineral race from another planet, created solely to serve the expansion of their society! They came to earth once, a long time ago! If they'd got their way, you wouldn't even be here!"

"I know! The Gem War!" Steven snapped, surprising the Doctor slightly. "Why do you think they _didn't_ get their way? Why do you think the Homeworld Gems left?"

"They left because..." The Doctor suddenly stopped. His face contorted in confusion, which slowly cycled around to pain.

He groaned and pinched his forehead, as though nursing a headache. When he opened his eyes again, Steven was shocked to see them glowing with a golden light.

"My memories are still..." The Doctor gasped. "The Gems... they were fought off..."

"By the rebels!" Steven elaborated, temporarily more concerned with persuading the stranger that the Gems weren't hostile, than finding out what was wrong with him. "The Crystal Gems!"

"But the rebels were wiped out..." The Doctor righted himself as his pain and the glowing in his eyes slowly subsided, he turned back to face Steven. "The Diamonds corrupted every Crystal Gem on the planet, because of what Rose Quartz did to Pink Diamond."

"But she saved them..." Steven finished the story, his anger dampened slightly by the fresh reminder of what his mother had done. "She protected the others with her shield, and they've been protecting the earth ever since."

There was a moment of stunned silence, as both occupants of the house thought the same thing.

"How do you know all this?" They both said in unison.

After a moment, it seemed like neither was prepared to stand down and answer the other first, so the Doctor simply rolled his eyes. "Alright, origin stories later, for now..." He walked around the counter, putting the crudely encapsulated Gems between himself and Steven. "You're telling me that this is the same Pearl who fought alongside Rose Quartz?"

"That's right!" Steven said, glad the man was beginning to understand.

"So who are these two?" He asked, indicating to the Amethyst and Ruby. He had never heard of either such gem fighting in the rebellion.

"Well, you must know about Garnet." Steven stated. The Doctor nodded briskly. "She's a fusion of Ruby and Sapphire."

The Doctor shot a startled look over his shoulder at Sapphire. He had always known that the Crystal Gem's Garnet was a fusion, there was no such Gem, after all, but a Ruby and a Sapphire!? It was like something out of a fairy tale.

"And this one?" He pointed at Amethyst.

"That's Amethyst. She was made on earth, but she didn't pop out until after the war ended."

The Doctor took a step back, slowly beginning to think he'd made a mistake. As he planned his course of action, Steven lifted the bowls and scooped the three gems into his arms.

"Ruby and Amethyst should be back before long... But Pearl could take weeks to reform..." He shot the Doctor an accusing stare.

The Doctor sighed, he realised he had some awkward apologies to make to the gems. He felt like this new regeneration didn't like apologising, and probably wouldn't do it very often. Regardless, he may as well get it over with. "Not to worry. Gems store backups of all their past forms in their data banks, so they can be brought back instantly, in battle."

Without elaborating, the Doctor pointed the sonic screwdriver at the gems in Steven's arms and activated it. All three gems immediately glowed and lifted into the air, out of the astonished half-gem's arms. The process was similar to how Steven had seen gems reform in the past, except much faster. A white form expanded from each Gem, as usual, but rather than cycle through the shapes of each past form, the light immediately snapped into the shapes the Gems had been in, moments ago, and inelegantly fell to the floor.

"Guys!" Steven cried out in relief.

He immediately ran forwards and threw an arm over the surprised Pearl and Amethyst's shoulders, pulling them into a hug. He reached the hand on Pearl's shoulder feebly towards Ruby, invited her to join in, but she was staring intently at the Doctor.

"You've got some nerve letting me reform in front of you..." She snarled at him. "You should have shattered me when you had the chance!"

Steven quickly ended the hug and ran in between Ruby and the Doctor. "Ruby, it's okay!"

"I shouldn't have poofed you." The Doctor admitted. "Although in my defense, you did attack me first."

"Steven, who is this person?" Pearl asked, still disorientated from suddenly losing her physical form, and then having it forced back upon her.

"Steven was right, he's a Homeworld Gem!" Ruby snapped, before Steven or the Doctor could reply. "He activated the Warp Pad!"

Amethyst and Pearl were immediately on edge. Their hands were braced to reach for their gems, although they didn't summon their weapons just yet.

"You did?" Steven asked the Doctor.

"Simple bit of psycho-electronic mental integration. Piece of cake for someone as clever as me, no Gem required." The Doctor smiled smugly.

Ruby's gauntlet materialised on her fist. "A likely story! Psycho-ecle... Yeah right!"

"Well phrasing aside..." Pearl cringed at Ruby's immature ranting. "Ruby's right. If you _did_ activate the Warp Pad, we can't simply take your word that you're not a Homeworld Gem. What species are you?"

"Wait!" Steven suddenly interrupted, his eyes widened in shock. "There are other alien races besides Gems!?"

Pearl rolled her eyes just slightly. "Yes Steven, in the entire universe, there are more than two sentient races." Her voice had just a hint of snobbish sarcasm.

Amethyst snorted. "Yeah dude, even I know that. Like, have you ever even counted how many stars there are? I mean, I haven't, cos' there's a ton."

"And there are several races known to Gem kind that could theoretically possess the psychic potential to interact with Gem technology. If you'll just tell us which you are, then you can be on your way."

The Doctor rubbed the back of his head awkwardly. "Does it matter?" He sighed.

Amethyst summoned her whip and stretched it between her hands, threateningly. "Only if you want to leave here _alive_!"

Steven knew Amethyst was joking, but the Doctor was clearly uncertain.

"You have to understand that we're in a sensitive position!" Pearl told the Doctor. With slightly less confidence than Amethyst, she drew her spear from her gem and targeted it at the Doctor. "Homeworld can't know about us!"

"Guys, calm down!" Steven shouted, growing more agitated, now that all three Gems had their weapons in hand.

"Look, you can see that I'm not a Gem!" The Doctor reasoned.

"He must be the one hurting Sapphire!" Ruby cried.

"It's a simple question!" Pearl emphasised her point.

The argument grew in intensity, to the point where the house's occupants merely shouted over one another, while Steven begged everyone to calm down. Eventually, the Doctor scowled angrily, and shouted over the din, "TIME LORD!"

The Doctor's authoritive bellow silenced the room for several seconds. Pearl was the first to speak, after dispersing her weapon and sighing irritably.

"Please take this seriously..." She scowled.

Ruby tensed up her arms and scowled. "Do you think we're IDIOTS?"

"Uhh yo, what's a Time Lord?" Amethyst asked Pearl.

"Time Lords are mythological creatures, spoken of by higher species' like Gems. They're said to be beings of great power and wisdom, but they're _not_ real." Pearl informed them.

"Well, obviously I'm biased, but I beg to differ." The Doctor said. He quickly learnt that his new regeneration was no more patient than his previous ones. Now that he knew that the Gems on earth were the Crystal Gems, he wanted to return to the TARDIS and track the Gem monster which had landed on the beach. "Now, if you'll excuse me..."

As the Doctor rudely pushed past Pearl on his way to the door, he found out that they actually wouldn't excuse him. Amethyst quickly lashed her whip around his ankles, sending him crashing to the floor, and when he rolled over, and pulled his Sonic Screwdriver from his pocket, Ruby shot across the room and sent it flying, with a furious swing of her gauntlet.

Pearl strolled across the room, as casually as if they had simply tapped the Doctor's shoulder. "There's a perfectly simple test which will put this 'Time Lord' nonsense to rest." She announced to the room in general. She reached up to her gem and, with a flash of light, a stethoscope materialised. Putting the buds in her ears, she elaborated. "Time Lords are said to have binary vascular systems." The Crystal Gems responded with blank stares. "Two hearts... That way when they're injured, one of their hearts can sustain them while their bodies rebuild themselves."

"Like I saw him do!" Steven announced, clearly indifferent as to whether or not Time Lords actually existed.

Pearl frowned irritably. "Yes, except that wasn't Time Lord magic, because this person clearly only has..."

Pearl placed the stethoscope to the Doctor's chest and listened. As her eyes widened in surprise, the Doctor smiled at her suggestively.

"Problem?" He asked her.

"Well... like many _real_ species, this man does indeed have two hearts." She paused for a moment. "Actually now that I think about it, I suppose any sort of heartrate does absolve you from being a Gem. Amethyst, let him go."

With a chiming sound and a flash of light, Amethyst's whip disappeared. "Sorry dude." She said to the Doctor, casually.

"W... we're just gonna let him go!?" Ruby demanded. "What about Sapphire!?"

Armed with the knowledge of who the Gems were, the Doctor felt a newfound compassion for the frozen Gem. "Ah, yeah I can help with that." He said, bluntly.

"You can?" Steven beamed in delight, although the other Gems seemed slightly more skeptical.

The Doctor climbed to his feet and made his way towards Sapphire. "Yeah, there's us chatting away like anyone's business, I forgot to mention- I'm the Doctor." He said.

Rather than smug or confident, the Doctor's voice was reluctant and remorseful. His recent actions had been like anything but those of a Doctor. The destroyer of the two most mighty races in the universe... He had committed genocide, he wasn't even certain if he could continue to call himself that.

Pearl rolled her eyes again. "We're Gems, we don't _need_ doctors!"

"Tell that to her!" The Doctor pointed at Sapphire, as he knelt in front of her. A brief inspection of the Gem, through the ice, confirmed his suspicion that her Gem would be in the palm of her right hand, since he knew that Garnet had one in each, and Ruby's was in her left. He turned to the small, red gem. "Oi sunshine, give us a hand over here, will ya?"

Ruby was clearly massively conflicted between her dislike of the Doctor, and her desire to help Sapphire. Grumbling under her breath, she stomped across the floor of the house towards them, her footsteps smoking slightly.

"I need to see her gem, thaw the ice here."

Ruby kept muttering angrily as she pressed her rapidly heating palms on the ice around Sapphire's right hand. "… stupid... weird alien... telling me what to do... believes in Time Lords..."

As with before, the ice began to regrow the moment Ruby moved her hand away, but the Doctor quickly took Sapphire's hand in his and placed his fingertips on her Gem, and closed his eyes. The Crystal Gems stared breathlessly, as the ice crawling up Sapphire's wrist began to slow, then stop, and then, very gradually, began to yield to the heat of the stove.

Realising the ice was no longer reforming, Ruby frantically leapt at Sapphire and began to maul the ice away, chunk by chunk. As soon as Sapphire's head was free, the blue gem pulled her long fringe away from her eye, and stared lovingly into Ruby's.

"Ruby!" She cried in relief, as the last few shards of ice fell from her.

"SAPPHY! Ruby almost screamed in relief. "Are you okay?"

"I... I think so."

Ruby threw her arms around Sapphire, weeping with joy and hysterically laughing with relief. She heaved her partner off her feet and into her arms and, with a blinding flash of light, the leader of the Crystal Gems was back.

"Garnet!" The Crystal Gems announced in relief.

"Are you okay?"

"What happened?"

"What was going on with your future vision?"

Garnet reached for her eyes and summoned her visor with a flick of her fingers. "The future changed suddenly and unexpectedly. Sapphire couldn't adjust to the infinite new futures which had become possible."

"So what did the Doctor do?" Steven asked, gratefully.

"He..." Garnet frowned and adjusted her visor slightly. "My future vision is gone."

Ironically, Steven, Amethyst and Peal recoiled in shock, while Garnet stood stock still, acting as calm as she would, had she claimed to have misplaced a pencil. The Gems, looked around for the Doctor, so that an explanation might be demanded, but while they had greeted Garnet, he had made his way over the door, where he was pocketing his Sonic Screwdriver.

"Well, see ya!" He waved, with a smile, before leaving the house, and the startled Gems staring after him.


	4. Chapter 4

"Wait!"

At Garnet's instruction, Pearl and Amethyst had stayed in the house, while she and Steven pursued their new acquaintance, for fear of overwhelming him. The Doctor was walking briskly down the beach, towards his TARDIS, and gave no response to Steven's call.

"Doctor, thank you." Garnet said, as they caught up with the Time Lord. "The Crystal Gems owe you a great debt."

"Your future vision will come back." The Doctor sensed what Garnet was building towards. "I just dulled it until the timelines restabilise."

"That's great, but... you don't have to leave!" Steven implored him. "I only just found out there are aliens besides Gems! Can't you hang out for a while?"

"Nope. That Gem creature hasn't gone far. It came to Earth from space because of something I did, now I have to take care of it before it hurts someone."

"But that's what we do, too!" Steven reasoned.

Garnet stood commandingly in front of the Doctor, just before he reached the TARDIS. "Doctor, protecting the Earth from creatures like this is the sworn duty of the Crystal Gems, no matter where they came from. Anyone who can say the same, is a brother or sister in arms. Let us help you."

The Doctor seemed to consider Garnet's offer for just a second, before calmly walking around her.

"I can handle it."

He drew his key from his pocket and tried the door. The key turned, but the door wouldn't open. The Doctor jiggled it a few times, before frowning in concern.

"I know you've finished repairing..." He said, quietly, after shooting an awkward look at the Gems. "I'm sorry for what I did... to them... You know I didn't have a choice. Let me in!"

"Is the lock broken...?" Steven asked, unsure of why the Doctor was talking to his ship. "Pearl is good with machines, maybe she can help?"

"No... She's fine... I'm the problem..." The Doctor said, quietly.

There was a moment of silence, in which Steven and Garnet shared a confused look. A few seconds later, the Doctor span around to face them, with a cheerful grin.

"Well, no use standing around. We've got a Gem monster to fight, haven't we?"

-x-x-x-

Resigned to the fact that the TARDIS wouldn't permit him access, the Doctor had returned to the house at the base of the temple, where he had begun examining the architecture and furnishings with keen interest.

"So... if you're all Gems, then why have you got a house?" The Doctor asked the room in general. "Gems don't need food or shelter."

"The house is actually Steven's." Pearl replied.

"Who's Steven?"

Steven eagerly lifted his hand and jumped on the spot. "Ooh! I'm Steven!"

"And you are?" The Doctor had been curious as to what relationship the boy had with these Gems. Although he had been suffering from severe regeneration trauma at the time, the Doctor could have sworn he remembered the boy wielding the powers of a Rose Quartz earlier.

"My mom was the leader of the Crystal Gems..." Steven said, with a hint of remorse. "I have her gem now." He elaborated, lifting his shirt to demonstrate.

Steven's words washed over the Doctor slowly as he processed them. "Your mum!?" He asked, incredulously. "What do you mean you have her gem? You can't just give your gem to someone, how does that work?"

"What Rose did is... unprecedented." Pearl admitted. "None of us are quite sure how or why she did it..."

"I asked my dad how, once." Steven told Pearl. "He said he'd tell me when I was older..."

"And who's your dad?" Asked the Doctor.

"His name's Greg Universe. He runs a car wash on the other side of town."

"Human?"

"Yup."

The Doctor's mind reeled. Of course, there were countless species who were able to have children with other species, depending on their genetic compatibility and the medical assistance available, but Gems couldn't have children at all! Never mind with organic life forms!

Before the Doctor could question the Gems further, Pearl steered the conversation in a different direction. "So what about you, Doctor? Even if you are a Time Lord." She emphasised the word 'are', to advertise her persistent skepticism. "What are you doing on Earth?"

"I spend a lot of time here. My ship sort of has a mind of her own, she beings me here a lot." Even more so now, the Doctor thought to himself, sadly.

"You wouldn't rather keep to 'planet of the Time Lords'?" Pearl mocked, with almost a threat of a smirk.

"Gallifrey..." The Doctor scowled. His sudden, dark tone surprised the Gems, especially Pearl.

Garnet was the quickest to pick up on the Doctor's reluctance to talk about his home. She placed a hand on Pearl's shoulder. "Where the Doctor's from isn't important right now." She said, gently. "Doctor, what do you know about the Gem monster?"

The Doctor's expression changed as though a switch had been flipped. "Right, the monster! It's an ancient Gem geoweapon called the Forged."

"Geoweapon?" Steven repeated. "Like the Cluster?"

"What's the Cluster?" The Doctor had never heard of such a thing.

"The Cluster is an enormous ball of broken gem shards..." Garnet began, frowning uncomfortably. "Forcibly fused together..."

"It was planted in the Earth's crust while the colony was being built." Pearl finished.

"Well what happened to it?" The Doctor asked, intrigued.

Amethyst snorted. "We totally kicked its butt." She invited Steven to high-five her, which he quickly obliged.

"We bubbled it." Steven elaborated, with a smile. "They're safe now."

"Well that makes sense." The Doctor said. "That the Diamonds would make something like that, I mean. Because the Forged was very similar, but it didn't work, at all. Rather than shards, the Forged is made up of hundreds of gems, which were ground to dust before they could even form for the first time, and turned to glass."

The Gems gasped and cringed in disgust. "I... I can't believe the Diamonds would do something like that..." Pearl whispered, her voice shaking.

"It was a long time ago, thousands of years before any of you were made, I'd reckon, and the Diamonds have gotten a lot cleverer since then. The Forged was supposed to destroy enemies of Homeworld, at the Diamonds' command, but because it's a solid Gem, it got too clever to do as they said anymore, so it left the Diamonds to be on its own, but as far as its appetite for destruction went, it was a shining success."

"So... how do we kill it?" Amethyst asked.

"After you all poofed on the beach, its Gem just flew into the sky on its own..." Steven said.

"That's right, we'll have to find it first." The Doctor said. "It's not like a normal corrupted Gem. It was drawn to you lot and the temple once, but it'll be clever enough to not come back..."

"Except..." Pearl began, stroking her chin and staring thoughtfully at the wall, next to the Doctor. "If there was a way to amplify our natural resonation pattern with other Gems, could it be possible to draw it back?"

While the Doctor considered it, Amethyst lifted an eyebrow in confusion. "Huhh?" She grunted, quizzically.

"All Gems are connected by a low-level psychic field." Garnet explained. "It makes us more efficient in both the battlefield, and Gem councils. It's too subtle for us to notice, but for a corrupted Gem, it's usually all they have to guide them."

"Ooooh, so that's why corrupted gems show up here so much." Amethyst realised. "Man, Ronaldo was right, we really do put people in danger..." She said, with a carefree smirk.

"That might work... I'll need some compatible Gem tech." The Doctor said, looking around the room at the Gems.

"We don't have a lot to hand." Pearl admitted. "Certainly nothing that could perform a task like that."

The Doctor wasn't discouraged. "Right then. You lot stay here, in case it comes back. I'll go to the original Gem landing site, and see what I can find."

As the Doctor walked towards the warp pad, Steven excitedly ran after him. "Wait, I'll come too! You might need a Gem to show you around."

Pearl seemed nervous. "Steven, that... place, is a little too dangerous..." She began, poorly disguising her slight remaining distrust of the Doctor.

Garnet evidently didn't share Pearl's skepticism. "Steven and the Doctor will be fine." She consoled her. "Take care of each other." She said, giving the Doctor his first order, now that they were embarking on a mission. "We'll keep an eye out, here."

Steven joined the Doctor on the warp pad, and was about to activate it, when he got first hand proof that the Doctor was able to do it on his own, as it burst into life, and the beach house vanished with a flash of light.


	5. Chapter 5

For the third time, Steven was greeted by the sight of the enormous, Homeworld flying saucer, lying on its side, with three legs pointing in various directions, and covered in foliage, with woodlands towering around it and stretching off into the distance. The Doctor and Steven stepped off the warp pad and made their way down the hill towards the crashed vessel.

"So... if you're an alien, why do you look like a human?" Steven asked, as they walked.

"Time Lords are one of the oldest races in the universe." The Doctor stated, gruffly, reluctant to talk about his people. "May as well ask why you look like us. Most Time Lords look sort of human-ish, but really we can look like anything. We change a lot, whenever we're hurt, it's called regeneration."

"So you're just like a Gem!" Steven confirmed his suspicion from earlier.

"Sort of, yeah."

"Could you look like a Gem after you regenerated?"

"Suppose so."

"So... if a Time Lord regenerated, and became like a Gem, and then they got hurt again, would they regenerate like a Time Lord, or would they reform like a Gem?"

The Doctor sighed. "Time Lords aren't Gems! We're organic, like humans."

Steven had many more questions, but sensed the Doctor didn't want to talk about his people, so instead, he decided to be more personal to him. "So, why did you pass out after you regenerated earlier?"

"It's a dodgy process." The Doctor explained. "It hurts a lot, and there's no guarantee that you'll be healthy after, or even if you'll survive..." The Doctor looked at the back of his hand, and a sparkle of golden light danced between his fingers.

"But... are you okay now?" Steven asked, worriedly.

The Doctor was hesitant to answer. Steven was clearly very sensitive and the Doctor didn't particularly want to make him feel guilty. "Ruby woke me up too early... I'm still cooking on the inside. It's too soon to say."

"Sorry about that..." Steven sighed. "Ruby can get a little crazy when she's worried about Sapphire."

The Doctor didn't reply, and the two continued in silence, until they reached a closed door in the side of the vessel. Steven was about to reach for the hand panel next to the door, when the Doctor commanded the door open with a zap from his sonic screwdriver. The two continued into the dimly lit chamber within.

Possibly too late, Steven's mind wondered back to the last time he had been onboard the ship, how he had led the Centipeetle back to her crew. The half-Gem's blood ran cold as he suddenly remembered he was in the same room where he had last left the group of monstrous corruptions. Steven was about to issue a hushed warning to the Doctor, when he bit his tongue, upon hearing the familiar sound of chirping and clicking mandibles. The Doctor, unaware of the presence of the monsters, had walked into the ship with far more confidence than Steven, and was currently standing at the control panel, where the Gems had once been heckled by Peridot, and was carefully dismantling it with his sonic screwdriver.

Looking up, Steven's fears were confirmed, when he saw the enormous, arthropodic Gem, slowly lowering from the ceiling. A set of pincers, dripping with acidic, green saliva, and surrounded by a mane of white hair, lowered towards the Doctor, menacingly.

"Doctor look out!" Steven cried, summoning his shield, and preparing to throw it at the corruption.

The Doctor spun around, and then noticed the Centipeetle. Rather than scared, he stood squarely in place, staring sternly at the green gem in the monster's mouth. Steven froze as, instead of attacking, the corruption rested her front legs on the ground in front of the Doctor, and then dropped the rest of her segmented body behind her. She reared her head up, blotting out the Doctor's vision with her hair and clicking threateningly. Still, the Doctor didn't move a muscle. The corruption opened her pincers wide and began to screech, but she had barely made a sound when the Doctor shouted over her, "Beat it!"

The monster recoiled slightly, cocking her head in confusion. Before she had time to consider her response though, the Doctor shouted at her again. "Now!"

Needing no further encouragement, the Centipeetle scurried up a nearby wall, and through a crack, into the ship's infrastructure, followed by three more Centipeetles, who had been cautiously watching the scene, from the ceiling.

"Wooow!" Steven gasped, as his shield dispersed. "That was amazing!"

The Doctor looked back to the console. He lifted a panel he had detached, and pulled out a black gem and a handful of cables from inside. "A little confidence will get you a long way in life." He said, smugly.

"I've never seen a corruption just turn and run from someone before! Well, except..." Steven hesitated for a second. "Except Jasper..."

The Doctor pulled a glass sphere, full of red and green beads from the machine. He smashed the sphere on the console and began carefully selecting from the beads that had been inside. "A warrior?" He asked, solemnly.

Steven nodded, then added, "Yeah..." when he realised the Doctor wasn't looking at him. The Doctor didn't reply, and continued working. "Are... you a warrior?" Steven asked nervously, wondering if that was what the Centipeetle had sensed in him.

The Doctor considered his response. 'No', 'sort of', 'I suppose so', 'none of your business'.

"Yes..." He reluctantly replied.

Filling his pockets with the objects he had selected from the console, the Doctor headed for a door, which led deeper into the ship. The gloomy corridor sloped upwards, dimly illuminated by the gaps in the ship's hull, made by plant roots, which snaked across the floor.

"So are you a warrior... or a doctor?" Steven asked, hesitantly, as he climbed up the corridor, taking handfuls of roots, unlike the far more agile Doctor, who strode onwards with his hands in his pockets.

"I chose the name 'Doctor' a long time ago... A lot's changed since then... I've changed..."

The corridor levelled out, and the pair entered another chamber. This one was pitch black, and reached out beyond Steven and the Doctor's field of vision. The Doctor produced his sonic screwdriver, and silently illuminated the bulb.

"My mom used to tell people that they could be whatever they want to be." Steven said, reassuringly.

"That's not the same." The Doctor scowled. He walked along the nearest wall, rapping his knuckles against it gently and listening. "Your mum was a rebel Gem. When she said that, she meant that people didn't have to do what others expect them to do. That's how I've always lived... And recently I've..." He looked at Steven for a few seconds and sighed, before continuing his tapping on the wall. "I've done some things that doctors shouldn't do..."

Eventually, the Doctor seemed to find what he was looking for. He rammed his elbow into the wall and a panel collapsed downwards, and a helmet, attached to the interior of the space by several cables came dangling out. The Doctor began carefully removing the cables, one by one, with the sonic screwdriver.

"You had to do something bad..." Steven sighed, sympathetically. "But that doesn't make you a bad person! Sometimes the best we can do... is just the least bad thing."

The Doctor removed the helmet and placed it on his head. He aimed the sonic screwdriver at it and had it emit several different frequencies of its whirring sound.

"How do you know I'm not just a bad person?" The Doctor asked, sincerely.

"I've met bad people..." Steven said, regretfully. "They don't care when they do bad things, they do them because it's fun, or because it's good for them, or because they think it's right, but you do care! You're like my friend, Lapis. You did something bad and it's tearing you up, because you're a good person."

The Doctor smirked. "Pretty insightful for a little kid."

"I've had to do bad things too..." Steven frowned. "The Gems used to have this friend, a Bismuth. She wanted to shatter Homeworld Gems, instead of putting them in bubbles, and I had to either let her do it, or stop her..."

The Doctor sympathised with what Steven had been through, especially at such a young age, but it was hardly the same as the choice the Doctor had had to make.

"What would you have done if it wasn't just one Gem, and bubbling wasn't an option?" The Doctor asked, his expression darkening slightly.

"Wh... what?" Steven asked, nervously.

"What if the Diamonds were going to destroy the Earth, maybe a lot of other planets too, and the only way to stop them was to destroy Homeworld first, and every Gem on it? Could you do it? Could you ever call yourself a doctor if you did?"

The silence that followed was deafening. The Doctor hadn't really expected Steven to answer, and didn't encourage him to do so. Leaving the helmet on his head, he began to walk across the chamber, but after just a few steps, he gasped in pain and doubled over.

"Doctor!" Steven cried out in alarm.

The Doctor's skin seemed to glow, a golden aura began to surround him and slowly intensified, illuminating the chamber. It lasted for several seconds, during which Steven could only stare helplessly, before the light slowly receded, and the room plunged back into darkness, the only light, coming from the sonic screwdriver, which the Doctor had dropped on the ground. The only sound was the Doctor's heavy breathing.

"Are you okay?" Steven whispered.

"Yeah..." The Doctor replied.

"I have healing spit, if that helps?" Steven offered.

"Nah, I don't need healing, my body's trying to reject bits of itself..."

"Do you need anything? Some food? Medicine? Physical therapy?" Steven offered, anxiously.

"Food? What... what food?" The Doctor asked.

Steven emptied out his pockets. "Let's see... some chips... a bar of chocolate... peanuts..."

The Doctor seized the bag of peanuts, savagely tore the top off and poured the contents into his mouth. He fell back down on all fours and winced in pain as another wave of golden light rippled over him for a moment.

"Protein..." The Doctor gasped. "Just the thing for cellular reconstruction. Should hold be for a few minutes."

"And then what!?" Steven demanded, on the verge of tears.

The Doctor hesitated. "Come on... we need that gear to fight the Forged."

The duo continued their journey through the ship in silence. Steven was consistently worried for his new friend. There were several more occasions in which the Doctor's skin or eyes glowed, but he didn't collapse again.

As well as the helmet, the Doctor found a pair of metal bands which, when clipped on his wrists, extended five tiny metal disks, on spindly arms, towards his fingertips. Apparently, they were used by Homeworld Gems to transmit bubbled gems to their bases, when they had recently transferred from somewhere else, and couldn't do it manually yet, like the Crystal Gems could. He also found a gleaming, metal gauntlet, which, after some repairs from the Doctor, was able to manifest a sword out of blue light, and also fire pulses of blue energy.

Although the Doctor kept the latter two items, he confirmed to Steven that it was the helmet that, when worn by a Gem, would attract the Forged to her location.

"Gotcha!" The Doctor exclaimed as, when he screwed a triangular green gem into the top of the helmet, several diodes illuminated and a robotic whirring sounded from within.

"It's working?" Steven asked, hopefully.

"One way to find out." Without warning, the Doctor placed the helmet on Steven's head.

Steven shuddered. There was a slight, unexpected ringing in his ears, and he felt a faint, tingling sensation, coming from his Gem. Steven wasn't sure what the Doctor's test involved, until almost a minute of wearing the helmet, when he heard a familiar clicking and chirping sound. He looked up to see the Centipeetles had climbed through the ship, and were peering through a hole in the ceiling. Satisfied in his handiwork, the Doctor removed the helmet, and a few seconds later, the corruptions scurried away.

"Hey wait... if that works on the Forged _and_ corrupted Gems, then won't we lure a bunch of corruptions to us as well as the Forged, when we use it?" Steven asked the Doctor.

"Depends." The Doctor said. "Not sure where a creature like that would go, if it wanted to hide on Earth."

"Are you... gonna be able to fight off monsters with us?" Steven hadn't seen the Doctor fight, unless one counted using Mayor Dewey's van as a weapon, and a fresh ripple of golden light had worked its way up the Doctor's body.

"Don't know. Even if I wasn't regenerating, this body's never been in a fight. Suppose we'll find out, won't we?"

Steven frowned. He considered telling the Doctor to sit the fight out, but somehow he knew that he would decline. The two quickly progressed back down through the ship, and back towards the warp pad.

-x-x-x-

Back in the house, Steven was surprised to find what remained of Peridot's escape pod strewn across the floor. After joining the Crystal Gems, Peridot had salvaged most of the small vessel, and used the parts to make meep morps, and gadgets like her defense drones. When Steven and the Doctor returned, Pearl was in the process of fitting what looked like a circuit board into a desk lamp, in place of a light bulb.

"We're back!" Steven announced.

"Yoo Steven! D-man!" Amethyst greeted them, from the couch.

Garnet had been standing motionlessly, looking out the window. She turned around, once Steven and the Doctor appeared. "How was your mission?"

"It went great! We got everything we needed." Steven triumphantly exclaimed.

The Doctor tapped on the helmet, which he had placed back on his head. "This'll pull the Forged right to us... As well as any corrupted Gems in the area."

"Whoa... are we gonna fight off an army?" Amethyst asked, excitedly.

"We can't risk a fight like that in Beach City, or anywhere where there are humans." Garnet stated.

"Well pretty soon, we'll know... exactly where the Forged is... and where... we can fight it..." Pearl grunted in annoyance, as she twisted the couplings at the end of two thick cables together, trying to get them to connect.

"You're repurposing the planetary guidance system from a Homeworld escape pod into a corrupted Gem detector..." The Doctor remarked. It was the first time any of them had heard him sound impressed. "Not bad for a Pearl."

Pearl rolled her eyes, trying to take it as a compliment. The Doctor walked past her, into the kitchen. As he passed, he flourished the sonic screwdriver, causing the couplings in Pearl's hand to immediately snap together. In the kitchen, the Doctor began unapologetically pulling food out of the cupboards and fridge.

With his eyes on the Doctor, Steven made his way to Garnet and whispered, "Hey Garnet, is your future vision back yet?"

"It's... fuzzy..." Garnet replied.

"I'm worried about the Doctor." Steven explained. "He's still hurt from before. He wants to fight the Forged with us, but I don't think he's strong enough."

"The Doctor has the air of someone who's seen plenty of battle. If he wants to fight with us, it's our responsibility as fellow protectors of Earth to respect his wishes."

In the kitchen, the Doctor was filling the blender with an inconsistent assortment of food and drink, including a carton of milk, a stalk of broccoli, several slices of bacon and a generous helping of syrup.

"Aw man, that looks good!" Amethyst commented, running over to him. "Throw some chilies in there for some kick!"

The Doctor frowned thoughtfully and nodded, pointing at Amethyst. "Synapse excitation, good thinking."

"Can you see what's most likely to happen to him if he fights with us?" Steven asked Garnet, as the blender kicked into life.

Garnet adjusted her visor and frowned. She was silent for several seconds. The Doctor downed half of his concoction, wiped his face on his sleeve, and handed the blender to an overly-eager Amethyst.

"Time Lords don't keep within established timelines." He said, calling across the house to Steven and Garnet, surprising them both. "Your future vision won't work on me."

Steven blushed slightly, embarrassed that the Doctor had been able to hear them. Thankfully, their attention was pulled elsewhere, before the conversation could resume.

"I've got it!" Pearl announced.

She held up the desk lamp, projecting a green rectangle onto the wooden floor, with several blurry shapes on it, around thirty bright white dots, and hundreds of tiny, purple pinpricks.

"Garnet, if you will."

Pearl held the lamp out to Garnet, inviting her to hold it up. Garnet quickly obliged, freeing Pearl's hands to make adjustments to the machinery.

"Now... this is a map of the Earth, albeit somewhat distorted due to being 2-dimensional..." Pearl explained. "The white dots are warp pads, and the purple dots are corrupted Gems."

Steven and Amethyst were appropriately shocked. "There are sooo many!" Steven remarked.

As Pearl made adjustments, the purple dots vanished, one by one, eliminated for being too small or weak, or simply for being a single Gem, rather than a corrupted fusion. Eventually, there was only one left. The map zoomed in on it, it didn't seem particularly far from a warp pad.

"It's in the desert!" Garnet exclaimed. "Pearl, how many corrupted Gems are between it and the warp pad?"

Pearl repeated the adjustments she had made, in reverse, and the purple dots reappeared. There were at least ten which were closer to the warp pad.

"Oh-ho boy!" Amethyst laughed.

"This is going to be tough..." Pearl said, with far less excitement.

Garnet rested the lamp on the ground. "Well Gems... and Doctor... Let's get to work."


	6. Chapter 6

"Okay... everybody get ready..." Garnet commanded.

The Gems and the Doctor had warped to the same pad they had used when the Gems had fought the Desert Glass and Steven met Lion. Then, they had walked a safe distance in the direction of the last known location of the Forged, to avoid damaging the warp pad in the upcoming battle.

"Should we maybe form Alexandrite before we begin?" Pearl asked. It seemed like a logical assumption that she would be needed.

"Not yet. Wait until we know what we're fighting." Garnet replied. "Steven, do the honors."

Steven took the helmet from the Doctor, who activated it with his sonic screwdriver, after Steven had put it on. The five of them braced themselves, standing in a circle, facing outwards. Almost simultaneously, five sets of weapons materialised, including the sword made by the Doctor's gauntlet. The team scanned the horizon in all directions, but the first corruption was able to sneak up on them, nonetheless.

One by one, the Gems and Timelord began to notice that the ground was beginning to tremble. Before any of them pointed it out, a long, brown tentacle thrust out of the sand and thrashed at the Doctor. The Time Lord leapt over the hostile appendage and swiftly severed it with a swing of his sword. The tentacle fell to the sand and exploded with a puff of smoke, but there wasn't a gem to be seen.

"Everyone watch out..." The Doctor warned, as the trembling grew more intense. "It's a big one!"

Immediately, three more tentacles erupted from the ground. Without delay, Steven, Garnet and Pearl engaged one each, but before any had been severed, the sand beneath the team began to shift, and swirl inwards, like a whirlpool. Steven dismembered the nearby tentacle by throwing one of his larger shields at it, but immediately stumbled, as he noticed the predicament they were in.

"Pearl, with me!" Garnet urgently ordered. "Steven, Amethyst, get the Doctor out of here!"

Amethyst lashed her whip around Steven's outstretched arm, pulling him towards her, and Garnet barely took the time to lift Pearl's hand and elegantly spin her around, before pulling her into an embrace. With two violent explosions of purple smoke, the mighty and dramatic Sardonyx stood confidently in the sinking sand, next to the far more humble Smokey Quartz, still wearing the Doctor's helmet.

Between the Gems and the increasing number of tentacles, a set of teeth began to reach out of the sand and slowly close around them. Smokey immediately drew a large, grey yo-yo from one of their gems, and lashed it around a tooth on the other side of the Doctor, and skipped along the sand, as the string receded, pulling them forwards. Once they snatched the surprised Time Lord in one of their three arms, Smokey yanked on the string, sending them summersaulting out of the monster's mouth, and onto the stable sand beyond.

The corruption seemed to be comprised mostly of its enormous, round head, the only orifice of which being its vast, circular mouth. With most of its body under the sand, it was unclear what, if anything, lay between the head and the network of tentacles rising from the sand.

"Sorry big guy... You're gonna have to skip to dessert." Smokey mocked, as they put the disorientated Doctor down.

Meanwhile, Sardonyx had flown high into the air, as the enormous corruption's mouth closed. With Garnet's gauntlets, she slammed her fists together, around Pearl's spear, forming the fusion's signature hammer, but with a sparkle of light, it morphed into a bright red drill.

Still airborne, she wagged her finger at the corruption, accusingly. "Keep eating at that rate, and you know what happens! Say 'ahhh'!"

Sardonyx plummeted downwards, head first, holding her drill in front of her. The drill met the monster's forehead, and it roared in distress, trying to burrow back into the ground, but Sardonyx persisted her attack, with sand closing in around them both.

"Heh... dentist joke." Smokey snorted, gently elbowing the Doctor's arm.

The Doctor didn't share Smokey's casual attitude. With eyes wide in panic, he shoved Smokey to one side, and lifted his gauntlet defensively, meeting the scythe-like appendage of the second corruption, which had darted across the sand, between the writhing tentacles of the first.

The second corruption was tiny, by comparison. It was bright green, and just over five feet tall. It hunched over and stared at the Doctor through purple, segmented eyes, like those of a house fly's, and had a pair of matching wings lying flat on its back. In place of arms, it had a pair of menacing scythes, each with a fearsome cutting edge. In the centre of its face, a small, red gem sat, where a mammal might possess a nose.

The corruption cackled madly and swung at the Doctor, which he quickly parried with his sword. The Doctor kicked the fusion in the chest, and used his slight window to slash at it, offensively. Still cackling, the corruption ducked underneath the sword and rammed its head into the Doctor's stomach, sending him sliding back across the sand, but impressively, staying on his feet.

Smokey was about to intervene, when they realised they had no shortage of corruptions of their own. Thundering across the sand towards them, were a pair of muscular quadrupeds. Similar in shape to the monster Jasper had recruited, and ultimately fused with, except they had no horns, and their manes flayed outwards, like those of a lion, except one was mint green, and the other light blue.

"Time to walk the dogs..." Smokey said dramatically, summoning a second yo-yo in another hand. "I mean... they're more like big cats, so I guess..." They resignedly shook their head. "Nah it's fine... it still works..."

Smokey shot into the air and began spinning head over heels, loosening the string of their yo-yos as they did. The weaponized toys spun further and further from Smokey, until they shot downwards, sending each crashing into the small of a monster's back, slamming them both into the sand, and destroying their bodies, instantly.

"Ha ha! Two zilch to Smokey Quartz!" They cheered, sealing a pair of gems in grey bubbles, and sending them to the temple.

Meanwhile, a mound of sand rose from beneath the ground, and slowly slipped away, revealing Sardonyx, heaving her monstrous adversary from the sand. Sure enough, the monster's body was comprised only of its spherical head, being held up in all four of Sardonyx's shaking arms, and dozens of streaming tentacles, several of which were now flailing dangerously, like fish out of water.

As Sardonyx struggled, the Doctor continued his stalemate with the agile, cackling insect. Each of them swung at each other, but the other was always fast enough to parry or avoid. The Doctor thrust his sword forwards, and the corruption gracefully shot into the air, slowly backflipping, and landing between two of the larger corruption's flailing tentacles. Aiming the palm of the gauntlet at his opponent, the Doctor unleashed pulse after pulse of blue light, which the small corruption effortlessly dodged, by darting back and forth.

The two of them raced between the enormous, flailing appendages. While the corrupted Gem was able to leap through the air, and dart between the tentacles like a pinball, the Doctor could only pursue it with the speed and agility of an above-average human, taking the opportunity, when it arrived, to continue firing upon his quarry.

With a heave, Sardonyx sent the monster in her arms crashing into the sand in front of her, and its tentacles flailing overhead, and down to earth behind it. The helpless, bug-like corruption, who had been using the tentacles for cover, was flung forcefully into the air, with a panicked screech. After soaring for several seconds, it slowed to a halt and began to descend. If its wings had ever worked, they certainly didn't now, as it flailed its limbs frantically, as it saw the Doctor sprinting in its direction. Clenching his fist, the Doctor's sword rematerialised, allowing him to hurl it upwards, like a javelin. As calculated by the Doctor, the sword shot through the monster's body, as it fell, and it exploded in a cloud of white smoke, leaving its small, red gem to fall into the sand. Breathing heavily, the Doctor walked over to the gem and picked it up in his free hand, which, with the help of the wrist band he was wearing, he used to seal it in a pitch black bubble, and send it to the temple.

As the largest corruption snapped repeatedly at Sardonyx, she repeatedly discouraged it by slamming her hammer into the side of its face. She cringed, as each blow seemed to bring it no closer to poofing.

"Times like this almost make one wish for a wrecking ball..." She cringed.

As the monster made another attempt to swallow the articulate fusion, Sardonyx held her hammer behind her back and swung it forwards and upwards, thrashing the monsters chin and sending its face pointing to the sky.

"Almost!" She victoriously emphasised.

On the base of the monster's neck, four gems were arranged in a perfect diamond shape. Calculating her force output, to avoid cracking them, Sardonyx delivered a graceful kick, ensuring the sole of her foot slammed against all four gems. Instantly, the monster roared in distress and pushed its face into the sand, attempting to burrow away again, but before it could, Sardonyx leapt forwards, spinning like a blur on her side, with her hammer held in front of her, and brought it crashing down on the same spot where her drill had met the corruption earlier, sending a shockwave of sand in all directions. With one last, feeble roar, the corruption exploded in a blast of white smoke, and Sardonyx was left with four gems to transition to the temple.

The Doctor stumbled through the sand, he was already feeling fatigued from his fight with the insect, when the sandstorm kicked up by Sardonyx and her foe disorientated him further. He didn't even notice the hulking, three-legged figure stomping through the sand behind him, but luckily, he wasn't alone. Smokey shot across the sand like a cannonball, ramming the new corruption aside with their shoulder, just as it rose one of its meaty fists, in preparation to attack the Doctor.

"Yo Sardonyx! Smokey called. "Batter up!"

As the corruption stumbled to the sand, Smokey drew three yo-yos from their gems and began spinning them around like turbines. The wind kicked up around the corruption, instantly, sending it flying towards Sardonyx. Without missing a beat, Sardonyx jokingly struck a batter's pose, and swung her hammer into the corruption forcefully, destroying its body instantly, and sending its gem shooting back at Smokey like a bullet. The smaller fusion caught the Gem in all three hands, while the force sent them sliding backwards on their feet.

"Can I just say, it is a treat to see you in action, Smokey!" Sardonyx gleefully said, winking with two of her eyes.

Smokey awkwardly rubbed the back of their head. "Heh... well it sure beats last time."

Sardonyx rolled her eyes in agreement. "Ugh, what was I thinking? Field documentaries are immensely more revealing than chat shows!" She held two hands out, with her fingers at right angles, imagining she was capturing Smokey on a screen.

As the fusions talked, the Doctor was engaging the final corruption. His new opponent was shaped roughly like a narwhal, and swam through the air, jabbing at the Doctor with a sharp horn, jutting out of its forehead. It wasn't nearly as fast or agile as his former adversary, but whenever the Doctor attempted to strike back, the corruption's body would become translucent, like water, revealing the spherical, blue gem at its core, and the Doctor's sword would pass harmlessly through it.

As he fought, the Doctor kept thinking of the conversation he had had with Steven on the crashed ship. Apparently Rose Quartz, one of the universe's greatest humanitarians, would have told the Doctor that he could be whatever he wanted. He did want to be a doctor, it was all he had ever wanted, but how could he call himself that now? Even if he could forgive himself for what he had done, this new version of him was hardly any better. In the few, short hours since he regenerated, he had done nothing but fight. Ruby, the Forged, and now these corruptions. The Doctor had no idea what they would even do when the Forged arrived. Even if they were able to defeat it, it was able to move without a physical form, so no bubble would hold it...

Between his distraction, and his dwindling strength, the Doctor made a fatal mistake. He lunged at the corruption, passing harmlessly through it, and before he could turn around, the monster's horn came bursting through his chest, below his right shoulder.

"DOCTOR!" Smokey and Sardonyx cried in alarm.

Smokey Quartz immediately flickered, and shrank down to Steven's size and shape, while the glowing light that was Amethyst reformed next to him. The young half-Gem ran over to his injured friend, while the towering Sardonyx ran past him urgently. She grasped at the incorporeal corruption, grumbling some panicked complaints as it passed through her hands, before resignedly sealing it, body and all, in a large, purple bubble. She shrank the bubble down to a normal size, and the corruption's body became a formless, blue mist, around its gem.

"Doctor! Are you okay!?" Steven cried.

The Doctor had collapsed to his knees and clutched the hole in his upper body. Rather than blood, a golden light radiated from his injury. Without waiting for approval this time, Steven licked the palm of his hand and slapped it onto the Doctor's, covering his injury. Steven waited, but it seemed like there was no effect. Amethyst and Sardonyx watched anxiously.

"Tough luck, eh?" The Doctor gasped. "I wasn't sure about this body anyway..."

"But you can get a new one, right? Like you did on the beach?" Steven begged, tears welling in his eyes.

The Doctor shook his head. "Doesn't work like that."

Sardonyx and Amethyst had their attention pulled from the Doctor, by a familiar thumping sound, as the enormous, black gem of the Forged came crashing down onto the sand. As it rose into the air, and its physical form expanded, Sardonyx turned to the smaller Gem.

"Amethyst dear, I think I might require your famous lack of restraint for this."

With a firm nod of confirmation from Amethyst, Sardonyx reached down and held her in her fist. The fusion glowed brightly, and began to expand, as Amethyst's gem took its place in the middle of the fusion's chest. With a glaring flash, Alexandrite appeared, her turquoise hair flaming behind her, and all six fists clenched, threateningly.

"Take care of the Doctor..." She snarled at Steven. "I'll handle this..."

The Forged had come back stronger, too. Its new body was twice the size of the tentacled form it had taken, on the beach, forcing even Alexandrite to crane her neck slightly, and rather than a cephalopod, it now had the shape of some monstrous bear or wolf, with no head, and its gem sitting protectively at its core. Finally, the Forged now had a dense, opaque skin, like thick glass, clearly much more protective than before.

Without waiting for the Forged to make the first move, Alexandrite flew into the air, above the monster. Her face lifted upwards, revealing the snarling mouth which ran along her chin, in which she conjured a ball of purple flames. Furiously, she unleashed an inferno upon the ground beneath her, like some terrible meteor shower, encompassing the Forged, and shrouding it in black smoke. She landed on the sand behind it, hoping to lure it away from Steven and the Doctor.

Alexandrite's plan worked all too well, as the smoke parted and a solid beam of white energy shot at her like a train. The titanic fusion crossed all of her arms defensively, meeting the blast. She flew off her feet and backwards along the sand, but was ultimately unharmed. A second blast of light came, aimed lower, and sending tidal waves of sand in both directions, but Alexandrite was ready. She rolled backwards onto her feet and leapt forwards, over the beam, and summoned Sugilite's mighty wrecking ball behind her. Twisting her body, Alexandrite sent it careening through the smoke, and crashing it into the Forged, sending it slamming into the ground, and dispersing the smoke, instantly.

Meanwhile, the Doctor was elaborating on his condition, for Steven.

"I only get one chance at each regeneration... And it's looking like I blew it."

"Because your shoulder got hurt!?" Steven practically shouted. "Pearl said Time Lords were the stuff of legends! A human could survive that!"

"It's not just this..." The Doctor nodded to his shoulder. It was still glowing, but the circular hole the corruption had left showed no sign of receding. "This body was never going to work out... All I was ever supposed to be is a Doctor, and I'm just not..."

The conversation was interrupted as the ground shook violently. The Forged had forced Alexandrite to the ground, where she was desperately trying to keep it from crushing her, by holding the head of her hammer against its belly, and jamming the base of the handle into the sand. Opening her second mouth, she unleashed a second blast of purple flames at its belly. The Forged groaned ominously, but didn't relent.

Alexandrite placed her feet against her hammer and pushed, sending her sliding from underneath the monster, before her hammer was destroyed, and she was crushed. She flipped back into her feet and conjured Opal's elegant bow. Moving two of her arms like a blur, she unleashed a maelstrom of white light, which bombarded the Forged, finally forcing it to retreat backwards, albeit only a few steps.

"Stop it!" Steven angrily shouted at the Doctor, over the chaos. "Stop pretending this is out of your control! No one made you stop being the Doctor and no one is keeping you from being one again!" Tears ran down his face. "If you want to lay there in the sand and die, you don't get to blame the universe for putting you there. It's your choice!"

Alexandrite faced dilemmas of her own. Although Opal's bow was proving the most effective, none of her weapons packed enough punch to pierce the skin of the Forged. Between Pearl and Sapphire's considerable intellect, they came up with a new plan. Focusing all her energy on Opal's bow, Alexandrite released one last flurry of white light, before dispersing the weapon. Pursing her lips, the mighty fusion unleashed a linear burst of flames, not at the Forged, but the sand in front of them. In the time it took the Forged to recover from its stunned state, Alexandrite had completed her task. She heaved from the sand at her feet, a colossal javelin of superheated glass.

Just as the Forged looked ready to attack again, Alexandrite heaved her glassen weapon, throwing it spinning into the sky. Moving so fast, she could have been mistaken for teleporting, Alexandrite flew upwards, after her weapon, as a fresh blast of energy from the Forged threatened to shatter her. Stopping in mid-air, above the monster, Alexandrite lifted her foot, gently stopping her spinning blade in its path, and leaving it pointing downwards, before summoning Sardonyx's war hammer, and ramming it like a chisel, sending it hurtling towards the monster so fast, it visibly disrupted the air around it.

With another explosion of sand, the Forged was skewered, as the glass spear shot straight through it and into the sand, missing the gigantic gem by inches. Just as Sardonyx had earlier, Alexandrite targetted her drill downwards and plummeted, aiming the drill head at the point where the spear had impaled the monster, hoping to exacerbate the injury, and reach the gem, but moments before impact, Alexandrite's heart sank. The Forged simply walked aside, with the spear flowing through its body as though the latter was made of water.

Alexandrite collapsed to the sand and her knees buckled, having been prepared to land on the monster's back. Before she could correct herself, the Forged unleased another blast of energy, which engulfed her head and shoulders. When the light faded, Alexandrite's head was gone, and Pearl's gem fell lifelessly to the sand, behind her. Alexandrite glowed brightly, and her form changed. Two of her arms vanished, and the remaining four grew more muscular.

"Big mistake pal..." A deep, rumbling voice snarled. The light faded, and the menacing Sugilite appeared. She cracked two sets of knuckles, while summoning her gigantic flail with her other two hands. "You just wiped out my self control!"

Sugilite swung her wrecking ball back and forth, each time slamming it into the Forged. Its gem glowed several times, preparing to attack, but Sugilite's continued bombardment seemed to keep it at bay. After swinging the weapon overhead and slamming the Forged into the sand, Sugilite furiously thrust her two right hands into the monster's body and grabbed its gem, while pushing against its skin with her left hands to keep her from being swallowed.

Sugilite's one visible eye, above her sunglasses, squinted in distress and she grunted angrily as she heaved, attempting to drag the gem right out of the monster's body. Before Sugilite triumphed, the Forged unleashed an explosion of energy from its gem, sending its attacker flying backwards onto the sand.

Pushing herself upwards, Sugilite was startled to realise that her two right hands were gone, and Sapphire's gem fell to the sand in front of her.

"You're gonna pay for that..." She snarled, before shrinking down and reforming once more.

Ruby and Amethyst's fusion was taller and slightly more plump than garnet, she wore a blood-red shirt, torn at the waist and sleeves, and, rather than hair, a blazing fire burnt from her scalp.

"NOBODY... HUIRTS... SAPPHIRE!" The new fusion shrieked. The flames that made up her hair engulfed her, and the resulting fireball shot at the looming monster furiously.

Uncharacteristically, Steven barely reacted to the new fusion, and kept his attention on the Doctor, as the Crystal Gem's losing battle began to draw to a close.

"Once all this is over, if I don't think you're a doctor, it won't be because of what you did before! I don't care what you did! What's important is that the earth needs you right now, and you're just giving up!"

"This thing is beyond my help..." The Doctor snarled, but a hesitation in his voice betrayed the fact that he knew Steven was right. "No one can fix what the Diamonds did to those miserable Gems..."

"Well fine..." Steven said, wiping the tears from his eyes and frowning angrily. "Stay here then. But I'm not giving up on my friends, or the Forged!"

As Steven left the Doctor, the tyrannical geoweapon slammed Amethyst and Ruby's fusion into the sand with its fist, leaving the last traces of Alexandrite, helpless in the dust. Steven stood before the monster, his shield on his arm, unflinching.

"I'm sorry this happened to you." Steven shouted up at the Forged, as it stomped towards him. The monster lowered itself slowly, and its gem floated through its body towards Steven, as though it were staring at him. "I'm sorry for the Diamonds, what they did, and for everything that happened to you since. But this has to stop, before someone gets hurt!"

The massive gem began to glow, and Steven gasped in alarm. His shield expanded, to cover him entirely, but he wasn't sure it would be enough. Even Alexandrite had been unable to stand up to such fierce attacks. The gem glowed with more intensity, the attack seconds away, and Steven squeezed his eyes shut and tensed up, fearfully. With Steven's words ringing in his ears, the Doctor shot to his feet. The gold light in his shoulder was glaring brighter too. He sprinted forwards as the Forged attacked, diving at Steven in an attempt to push him out of harm's way.

As the Doctor and Steven made contact, the golden glow of regeneration energy consumed them, blotting them from sight. Slowly, the light faded from gold, to pink, to white, and then faded away, and Steven and the Doctor were gone. In their place, was someone new. He was tall and thin, with gleaming, white skin and golden eyes. The pink gem of a Rose Quartz shone proudly from his navel.

The Forged wasn't discouraged in the slightest, and the most ferocious blast of energy yet shot from its gem. With a pulse of light from his eyes, the newcomer lifted the palm of his hand, as though commanding the beam of energy to stop... which it did. The light froze, like water turned to ice. With a gesture from the glowing person, the light receded, like a video being rewinded, back into the gem.

"We... FUSED!?" The interspecies fusion shouted, with an enormous grin. "This is unbelievable! It's unheard of! It's... way too much power any one person should have..."

The fusion's voice was an amalgamation of Steven and the Doctor's accents, just like Garnet's, but at the same time, it quietly echoed, like he was standing in a vast cave.

"I mean... The power of a Time Lord, channeled through a gem? What do you even call that?"

If the Forged was stunned or awed by the development, it didn't show it. Accepting that its energy pulses were ineffective, it reared up and sent its foot hurtling at Steven and the Doctor. With perfect reflexes, the fusion shot at the Forged, flying through its body like it was made of smoke.

"A white..." The fusion began to answer his own question. "Point..." He punched the enormous gem sending it flying from the monster's body, which promptly vanished. The fusion vanished and reappeared above the gem. "STAR!"

White Point Star punctuated the last word by sending the gigantic gem hurtling back towards the sand, with a swing of his fists. The gem collided with an explosion of sand, and the fusion quickly joined it. Having come to rest for mere seconds, the geoweapon's body began to slowly expand once more.

"Whoa there, not so fast, sonny!"

From White Point Star's hands, an enormous bubble of sparkling pink and gold light encompassed the gem, lifting it from the sand and hovering in the air.

"Hope there's room for this in the temple..." He said, but then, the golden light of his eyes narrowed, thoughtfully. "Although just this once... What if we could do better?"

The fusion's eyes closed, and they pointed the palms of their hands at the bubble. From the perspective of White Point Star and the Forged, the sky slowly turned dark, then illuminated again. Back and forth, the day and night went, getting steadily faster, with the sun and moon flying overhead, until eventually, all they could see was a hazy, blue blur as White Point Star undid time itself, around the tormented geoweapon.

After almost ten minutes, the enormous, black gem began to change, within its bubble. Starting at the top, it began to dissolve into sand, until the bubble contained a shapeless, black cloud. Then, one by one, tiny, spherical gems began to form from the dust. The bubble expanded, and slowly faded away as the air began to fill with hundreds of bead-like gems, of all colours. The changing sky began to slow, as the last gems were reconstructed, and eventually stopped, with the sun shining down above them.

White Point Star collapsed to his knees in exhaustion. Looking up at the gems, filling the air above him, a grin spread across his face, and he laughed triumphantly. "Fantastic!"

With a flash of golden light, Steven and the Doctor were propelled away from each other. Although his shirt and coat were still damaged, the hole in the Doctor's shoulder was gone, and he rose to his feet, as though he had just woken from a refreshing nap, without a hint of regeneration trauma.

One by one, the gems, still floating in the air above them, began to take their forms for the first time ever. Each one's size was relative to their gems, the largest barely reaching a foot in height. They resembled fairies in shape, with their dress-like forms, and delicate wings, but they were translucent, like water. Shortly after reforming, they began to fly away, in different directions.

"Oh my gosh..." Steven breathed. "WE DID IT!" He cheered excitedly, jumping up and down and waving his arms. "That was amazing! We changed the fabric of reality just to save those Gems!" He looked up, with tears of joy, welling in his eyes, watching the Gems flying back and forth. "What will they do now?"

"Up to them." The Doctor replied. "All they were ever meant to be is a weapon. Now they can choose for themselves."

"Just like you!" Steven smiled, suggestively.

"Yeah..." The Doctor agreed. "Like me... I think I'm ready to be the Doctor again."

"Well... I can think of a few hundred Gems who'd say you're a pretty darn good one!" Steven laughed.

Suddenly, there was a sound. The same groaning, wheezing sound Steven had heard on the beach, before the Doctor appeared, coming from his coat. The Doctor reached into his pocket and pulled out the TARDIS' key. It was glowing brightly.

"What does that mean?" Steven asked.

The Doctor smiled. "It means my ship agrees..."

-x-x-x-

"This place is amazing!"

The TARDIS had reconstructed itself, just like the Doctor. The control room was filled with a golden glow, from circular lights, lining the walls, around a glowing, green control console, with a central column reaching upwards. Coral-like structures reached upwards to the ceiling, from just beyond the console.

Steven and the Doctor had returned to the beach, with a reformed Amethyst and Ruby, holding Pearl and Sapphire's gems, respectively. They had said their goodbyes to the Doctor at the house, and left Steven to join him at his ship, to do the same.

"It's just like the Roaming Eye!"

The Doctor entered the control room, having rid himself of his torn and sand-covered clothes. Instead, he was wearing a green jumper and a black leather jacket.

"Roaming Eye? I'm offended!" The Doctor said, jokingly. "Roaming Eyes compress space. This place?" He waved a finger around at the ceiling. "Whole other dimension."

"Is it... like the temple?" Steven asked.

"… Yeah, sort of." The Doctor admitted.

"So what are you gonna do now?"

The Doctor pulled a monitor on the console around to face him. It displayed a map of the earth, zoomed in on the United Kingdom. "The Forged came to earth because it was hiding from the Time War, and it wasn't alone. Aliens and monsters like it are gonna be coming from all over for a while, and it's my job to make sure they don't hurt anyone."

The Doctor read the stream of data, next to the image of the UK. The TARDIS was picking up the biometric signature of the Nestene Consciousness, unless he was mistaken.

"Well... It was great to meet you..." Steven smiled.

The Doctor smiled back. "And you. You know, I always sort of wanted to meet Rose Quartz... Something tells me this was even better."

Steven laughed gently. "Pearl says we're a lot alike."

After they concluded their goodbyes, Steven left the TARDIS, and backed away, after closing the doors, curious to see how it moved. He was expecting the box to zip away into the distance, like a Gem ship, so was surprised when, with another wheezing sound, and a few flashes of the box's light bulb, The Doctor's ship simply faded out of sight.

Steven laughed again, and wondered what Pearl would have thought of the Doctor's ship. She had said Time Lords were legendary creatures of great power and wisdom. That sounded about right.

* * *

 **Hey guys, so thanks for all the great feedback. I will be caving into demand and writing a sequel to this story, starring the 10th Doctor and the Crystal Gems, but it'll be separate to this one. So either follow my updates, or keep an eye on the Doctor Who/SU crossover pages, if you wanna read it. Hope you look forward to it!**


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